THE COOK -- DVD review by porfle

One of the more difficult feats for filmmakers to pull off successfully, it seems, is the "intentionally stupid" movie. Usually a parody of some form of exploitation flick, the intentionally stupid movie can turn out one of two ways: either clever and funny, or just plain stupid. THE COOK (2008), which emulates both teen slasher movies and teen sex comedies, falls somewhere in between.

Wishing to break into Hollywood with an attention-grabbing debut, writers Nicholas Bonomo and Francisco Rodriguez thought to themselves, "What implement of death has heretofore failed to be employed by slasher villains?" We've already seen chainsaws, axes, machetes, large drills, toolboxes full of tools, and just about everything else that can be wielded as a weapon. Then it hit them: kitchen utensils. And thus the character of The Cook was born.

The movie opens at the Lambda Epsilon Zeta sorority house (note the initials) where a small group of girls have decided to stay behind while everyone else takes off on a weekend vacation. Names aren't really important--all you need to know is that there's a studious girl, a bitch, a ditzy blonde, a bible-thumper, an exercise freak, a lesbian, and another lesbian. I may be leaving out a lesbian, but I sorta lost count. Anyway, unlike any sorority house I've ever seen in a movie, this place keeps a full-time chef on hand and the girls all gather for sit-down meals in the dining room three times a day. Trouble is, the new Hungarian chef currently serving up the grub for the gals turns out to be a giggling psycho whose culinary specialty is "filet of college babe." And so, one by one they end up on his butcher's block and become delicious entrees for the unsuspecting survivors to scarf down until it's their turn. Sloppy Joes, anyone?

We're not really too broken up about it, either, since most of these characters are either totally obnoxious, unforgivably moronic, or simply not very well-developed. We do get to see a number of subplots along the way, such as: the statuesque redheaded lesbian seducing the innocent bible-thumper in a rather titillating dominatrix scenario; the exercise freak driving her nerdy tutor into a sex-crazed frenzy until finally giving in and riding him like a stationary bike; and the studious girl forming a friendly relationship with The Cook, who seems to have taken a liking to her since she isn't as bitchy or flaky as the rest of the girls on his menu. Will she be the traditional "last girl standing" at the end of The Cook's inevitable slice-and-dice rampage? Will there even be one? You'll just have to watch and find out.

Whether or not you want to do this depends on how starved you are for entertainment, because THE COOK is definitely not "Must-See DVD." It's more like something you stumble across while channel-surfing late at night and get caught up in for lack of anything better to watch. It took me awhile to stop worrying about how incredibly dumb the dialogue, characters, and events in this movie are and resign myself to the fact that they're, yes, intentionally stupid. I even came to realize that the cast isn't as bad as I initially thought--they're actually pretty good--it's just the script they're forced to enact which often makes them look like amateurs.

There's a fair amount of naughty stuff going on (like, you know, nudity) to satisfy our more prurient interests, mainly of the "Cinemax After Dark" variety. The murder scenes themselves aren't particularly exciting, though a couple of them feature some mildly interesting makeup effects, while much of the gore consists of pig entrails and other yucky items standing in for human remains. Mark Hengst (HAUNTED FOREST), whose audition tape is one of the DVD extras, does a pretty good job as The Cook, whose only English seems to consist of either "I am the cook!" and a thumbs-up "O-KAY!" When he finally goes completely off his rocker and decides to off the rest of the cast once and for all, the results are non-scary but fairly entertaining in a slapstick sort of way.

Director Gregg Simon and cinematographer Brian Crane manage to make it all look better than you'd expect, with a visual style that would fit comfortably into a much better film. The image is anamorphic widescreen (2.35:1) and the Dolby Surround sound is good. Extras include a commentary track with executive producer/writer/editor Nicholas Bonomo and cast members Mark Hengst, Makinna Ridgway, Kit Paquin, Nina Fehren, and Brooke Lenzi, a behind-the-scenes featurette, and that audition tape which shows Hengst nailing the part.

Not too great but not all that bad if you catch it in the right mood, THE COOK is the kind of movie that I wouldn't go out of my way to watch, but managed to enjoy on the old "dumb fun" level. In other words, it's no gourmet meal--more like a big platter of greasy, ketchupy junk food for the brain.